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toenail off. It also burned a hole through his pocket watch to preserve the
time, 3:30, that he was initiated into the extremely small circle
of individuals who have survived a direct hit by a lightning
bolt.
After being struck two more times, Sullivan had a dream in March of 1972 that he would be the target for lightning in April. He dreamed that he was in the woods and was struck on the back of the head, which set his hair on fire. His knees buckled from the force of the bolt, but he was not knocked down. On April 16th, the dream was realized in all details except that, rather than being in the woods, he was at the park registration station in Loft Mountain Campground. When his hair caught on fire, he unsuccessfully tried to put his head under the spigot in the restroom and finally had to smother the flames with wet paper towels. In June 1973, Sullivan again had a dream he would be struck by lightning and July was indicated as the month for its occurrence. This dream troubled him because the outcome of his meeting with the lightning was not revealed. He attempted to be extremely careful all during the month of July and seemingly had averted his premonitory dream. However, on August 7th, when he got out of his truck at Eaton Hollow, he glanced up and actually saw a lightning bolt streaking toward him. The bolt hit him on the head, burned a hole in his hat, and once again set his hair on fire. His underclothes were also set on fire and his left shoe was knocked off without even breaking the laces. This last encounter with lightning left him with the inability to experience pain. Sullivan has had one further dream dealing with lightning bolts; fortunately, this one contained the message that there were no more destined to come his way (3). Should We Have a National Dream Registry?
All of the precognitive dreams we have been discussing so far have dealt with premonitions of events about to befall an individual, although in several of these examples a large number of people were eventually affected by the foreseen calamity, as when the assassination of a political head of state occurred. There have also been precognitive dreams recorded where the event itself involved a large-scale disaster. A disaster that captured wide public attention was the sinking of the Titanic in 1912. Through diligent investigation, Dr. Ian Stevenson assembled corroborated reports suggesting extrasensory awareness of the ship’s sinking from 19 individuals. Of the ten precognitive cases, 176
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